Spotlight on Christine Jordan and her 30 for 30!

NAPOWRIMO - National Poetry Writing Month, 2021, the Los Angeles Poet Society shared a poetry prompt calendar for a poem a day, often referred to writing 30 for 30. 30 poems for 30 days in the month of April. Poet Christine Jordan took upon the challenge, creating an exquisite poetic collection,
We want to share her poems with you, and hope they inspire you to embark on our 2022 NAPOWRIMO Challenge!

Inspired by 2021 LAPS NAPOWRIMO Challenge:
Poems Du Jour by CE Jordan
bloom 4/14/21
I am beginning to bloom
And what is commonly called
A late bloomer in my case is
So late I would say I am more a
Transplanted shrub, blooming
Being a strange and distant memory
So let us all be the perennial
Bloomers, the right on time bloomers
The erratic bloomers, the evergreen
Buds and shoots, and not worry
About keeping any schedule at all
As long as we can witness our very
Coming to life coming to terms coming
By it accidentally or just coming to it
Graciously, as gracious as an old dog
succulent 4/15/21
If a meal is not succulent then it is dry
And unless you are traversing the South
West or trying for the perfect tan I do not
Think one strives for this state of mealiness
So why not juicy succulence, the great family
Of totally inedible plants called succulents?
Airy, blue and grey with their fiesta blooms loaded
With liquid, not cactus the canteen of the desert
But the houseplant cousin of Carmen Miranda’s
hyperactive hibiscus and headdress of fruit
I myself prefer the succulent salsa beat of the
Ricky and Lucy easy care echeverias and aloes
Bleeding sticky liquid and begging for more
typing 4/16/21
8th grade was when I learned to type
Yes on a typewriter and they call it word
Processing now, done on what is called
A laptop, see it is easy so easy that my mate
Who never learned to type can still do it with
Only two fingers so how did he type his papers?
I used my quick typing mom to finish my papers
In high school for me a bad night one night at
My dad’s job where the fastest typewriters
Lived it was better when I left home to pound away
On my own electric job, oh how did we do it before
All the endless keyboard shortcuts! I am back in
The 8th grade in a huge room with girls in full skirts
And straight skirts, knobby knees bent and fingers and
Thumbs pounding away to beat the quick brown fox
erasure 4/17/21
1
With respect to typing we correct the heck out of the
Outcome of flying fingers on soft pads these days
But reminiscing about mistakes let’s reflect on erasers
And white out and correcting tape and thank our lucky
Stars for tech advances! now my mom toughed it out on
Her Selectric when she wrote novels and their many
Revisions, many, all with the inconvenient paint and tape
Oh when she got a computer it was a no go, not even
Willing to lift her flying fingers from her rough keys, but
Then all her words were safely on paper, oh the days!
2
Things that get erased:
some of our feelings
certain memories
whole paragraphs with the slip of a tip of a finger
good recipes
bad events
wrinkles because we really are growing younger
rabid 4/18/21
Bitten by the bug dog raccoon
Taken by the swath of moon
Eaten by the mug of a swoon